


Scars

by Eustacia Vye (eustaciavye)



Category: Pitch Black (2000)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-01-27
Updated: 2011-01-27
Packaged: 2017-10-15 03:31:42
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,916
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/156590
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eustaciavye/pseuds/Eustacia%20Vye
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"I never thought I'd smell that kind of beautiful again," Riddick rasped, that deep voice reverberating inside Carolyn's chest.</p><p>She had only been fooling herself. She would never be free of his memory.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Scars

Carolyn shouldn't be this close to him. She shouldn't depend on him. Riddick had thought she was dead and left that godforsaken rock of a planet, and it had taken years for her to recover from nearly dying. She was older now, supposedly wiser, and he didn't recognize her face. The hair was longer and darker, there were some lines on her face and scars all over her back and abdomen. While she had never been terribly vain before, now she absolutely didn't reveal any skin. She was no longer a pilot, but taught at an academy. It was the best compromise she could have made, but it still left her feeling hollow inside.

Riddick was being hailed as a god, and she had to come see him. It was impossible not to remember him, though she had tried to forget. Carolyn told herself she wasn't sentimental, that she was glorifying his memory because he had gone back to save the others even if he had left her behind. He couldn't have known she wasn't dead. She remembered what those creatures had done to everyone else when the lights went out.

His eyes rolled past her and didn't see her, and she let out a breath she hadn't known she was holding. He didn't remember her. He didn't recognize her. Maybe that would be enough to make the dreams stop. Maybe now she could be free of that place.

That night she startled awake. She lived alone and rarely socialized. Few people knew where she lived, and she liked it that way. Now she was regretting that decision; though she couldn't say why exactly, she knew she wasn't alone in her room any longer. There was nothing about the shadows that were different, but she _knew_ someone was in the room with her.

"Is someone there?" she asked, her voice more tremulous than she hoped it would be.

"I never thought I'd smell that kind of beautiful again," Riddick rasped, that deep voice reverberating inside Carolyn's chest.

She had only been fooling herself. She would never be free of his memory.

The shadows shifted and he rose from the foot of her bed. He crawled over her, the covers pressing down over her, trapping her beneath him. "I thought you died," he said softly.

"For a long time, I thought I would, too."

She could remember the rain, the taste of those creatures' blood, the feel of their flesh in her mouth. She'd been a wreck when a scout ship picked up on the distress signals and found her, but she had still been alive. Just barely, but still alive. No one else would have understood that, but Riddick would. He had always understood things like that.

They stared at each other in silence for a long time. Both were comfortable with silence, and neither wanted to be the one to break first.

It was Carolyn that moved first, pulling her hand out of her blankets and covering his cheek. She rubbed her thumb along the edge of his lower lip, seeing the shine in his eyes. He took the pad of her thumb between his teeth, running his tongue along her skin. His eyes never left her face, and she wished she could read him. Carolyn had never been able to predict him or understand why he did the things he did. He was a killer, of that she was sure. Everything else was a mystery.

Riddick gradually lowered himself over her, her thumb still in his mouth. His weight was braced on one hand, and he placed his hand at her back, between her shoulder blades. She was wearing a very thin nightdress, and she wondered if he could feel the scars there. She didn't want to ask him, didn't want to break this spell. If they didn't speak, she could pretend this was just a dream.

He lifted her up to meet him, and he let go of her thumb to kiss her. It was rough and possessive, just as she remembered. Carolyn wrapped her arms around his shoulders and made a soft sound low in her throat at the sensation. It felt almost like floating at first, and then the covers pressed too tightly against her. She was pinned, and the panic set in. She kicked at the covers to try to get them off of her. Riddick lowered her back to the bed and tossed them aside, then pushed the nightdress up from her legs. Carolyn froze when he bared her scars, not sure if she should run.

His fingers fell to the twisted tissue, stroking them carefully. She nearly wanted to cry, and she bit her lip to keep from covering herself back up. Riddick looked back up at her, taking in her trembling lips and agonized expression. Deliberately, he pulled off the nightdress and then bent his head down to lick and kiss the scars covering her body. Carolyn let out a choked sob and pushed at his shoulders, but she couldn't get him to move. His lips were gentle against the delicate scar tissue, as if they were fresh and would break under too much pressure. She hated them, hated the reminder at how close she had come to death. She hated thinking of herself as weak.

Riddick found the matching scars on her back, and Carolyn let out a low sound. It sounded more like a wounded animal than a person, and Carolyn could remember the taste of her own fear in the dark on that planet.

"I would have ripped them all apart if I had known," he said, lips poised over the scars between her breasts. "I never would have left you there. I should have known."

Something in her chest broke at those words, and she could feel the tears burn along her cheeks. He hadn't forgotten. Whatever it was between them, he had felt it, too.

Licking the tears from her cheeks, Riddick moved over Carolyn, pinning her to the bed. It was small and narrow, not the kind of bed that was shared. He felt massive above her, and Carolyn could feel the dark closing in. Choking on the ghostly feeling of pain in her chest, she twisted beneath him and tried to push him away. He moved back, watching her closely. She couldn't say anything, couldn't meet his eyes. Hyperventilating, all she could taste was blood of those creatures.

"We all pay something to survive, Carolyn," Riddick said, entirely too understanding for her comfort.

Carolyn sat up, not able to meet his eyes. His fingers traced the scars on her back, and when she didn't push him away he touched the thick scars on her front. She was pinned between his hands, his lips at her shoulder. This she could tolerate. This didn't feel like anything other than it was, Riddick mysteriously in her life again and upending everything she had ever known about herself.

Twisting in his grasp, Carolyn held him as he moved to run his lips along her chest. He traced the scars with lips and tongue and fingertips, making her gasp and shudder. She pushed at his clothes, baring his chest to her touch. Wordlessly, he helped her undress him, then he pulled her on top of him. Absurdly grateful, she straddled his waist and looking into those shimmering eyes of his. "What did I pay, Riddick?" she asked, her hands spread across his muscled chest.

"The last of your illusions," he said, pulling her down so that he could thrust into her. She gasped, nails raking welts across his chest. His hands were at her back, steadying her until she found a rhythm. Then he palmed one breast, a swirl of scar tissue replacing a nipple. He rubbed at the skin gently, abrading the scars, making her moan. She hadn't thought she could still feel pleasure from that kind of touch. She had thought she was dead and numb to that.

Carolyn gave herself up to the sensations rolling through her, rocking hard and fast over Riddick. This was what they should have had years ago, if those alien creatures hadn't stolen the time from her. She might have cursed herself for it later, might have thought she was even more callous and soulless than she had already thought herself to be. But he was right; it was in dragging herself from the brink of death that she had really learned who she was. She had been willing to do anything to survive, anything at all.

She cried out when she came, and Riddick urged her to continue. He was still thick and hard inside her, all too real as he stroked her body. He touched her scars reverently, and she supposed they were badges of honor. She had survived something terrible and come through it. She was still here, still alive, and at the moment she was _gloriously_ alive.

When Carolyn nearly collapsed, Riddick slid out of her and urged her onto her back again. This time he leaned back and away from her torso, somehow knowing that she couldn't be pressed in or caged. He drove into her repeatedly, moving hard and fast, his hands tight as bands over hers. They were pinned on either side of her head, but she didn't feel trapped in the slightest. She looked up into his intense gaze and surged upward to meet his thrusts. His breath was quick, his grunts barely audible. Carolyn was loud in the darkness, not caring if Riddick liked the sounds of her passion or not. She nearly screamed when she came, tight around him. He let out another grunt and stiffened above her, then blew out a long breath.

As difficult as it was on her narrow bed, he did his best to fall to the side of her. She appreciated that, and ran her hands along his face. "Riddick? Are you staying?"

"Are you offering?"

"I don't know what I'm offering."

"I've got weird shit going on right now," he said, which wasn't much of an explanation at all. "Do you really need to be here?"

She thought of teaching, of the life she had carefully built for herself. It was empty, really. It was a house of cards waiting to tumble.

Riddick watched her closely as she thought about it, not pressuring her in the slightest. "I don't have anywhere else to go," Carolyn said finally.

"Do you want to be a queen?" he asked. He wasn't teasing her, and Carolyn didn't think he would be that kind of man anyway.

"Of what?"

"Of the dead." He shrugged at her incredulous stare. "Long story."

"There's enough dead in my life," Carolyn told him quietly.

"Yeah. There's that."

He was offering her something she couldn't quite grasp. "You're lonely, aren't you?" she asked suddenly.

"Aren't you?"

She wanted to tell him no, but that would be a lie. "I'm tired, Riddick."

He pulled her against him, and she settled over his chest. His heart beat strong and sure beneath her ear. "Rest, then."

"Will you be here in the morning?" she asked in a small voice.

"If you want me to be."

Carolyn couldn't tell if he cared one way or another, his voice was so flat. "I'd like it if you were."

Riddick's arms settled heavily around her, but she felt almost comfortable. "Then I will be."

For the first time in years, there were no nightmares of the dark.


End file.
